Olbermann Is Back: Garners Decent Numbers On Current TV

Current TV's "Countdown With Keith Olbermann" had some good -- but not great -- rating news on its Monday premiere.

The 8 p.m. show hit 179,000 viewers among the 25-54 crowd -- well over the 30,000 viewers the network averaged for the first quarter. This bested CNN's "In the Arena," which drew 89,000 25-54 viewers.

But Olbermann trailed other shows on Fox News, HLN or MSNBC, coming in at fourth place in the time period.

MSNBC's "Last Word with Lawrence O'Donnell," the show that replaced
"Countdown with Keith Olbermann" on MSNBC, had 237,000 viewers, landing in third place. HLN's "Nancy Grace" was in second place with 419,000, and Fox News' "The O'Reilly Factor," the still-dominant leader, had 735,000.

Olbermann had said not to expect much from the first night's numbers. He said his show needed to build audience awareness.

Ratings-wise, Current TV is still at a major disadvantage to bigger networks, like CNN and MSNBC. For example, Current TV has 60 million TV subscribers compared its larger rivals, which have 95 million-plus TV homes.